Through policy and culture, the way we test students in the United States has begun to show that we do not assess students on knowledge and understanding as much as we do on memory. The consequences are both economic and personal and relate to problems concerning critical thinking. In the strip above, Calvin demonstrates the predicament. He finds fault in the “system” and the way it values information. Many students would relate to his caustic sarcasm.

To understand the problem of testing, we should understand its function. One part serves to gauge how much a student has learned. The other part allows for categorization — testing is an effective tool with which we can compile rankings, establish grade-point averages and help get a visual standing of a student’s academic progress. These are fair reasons to test.

Nevertheless, testing has its limits, especially in the job market. In a recent New York Times article, Kevin Carey explains two studies conducted by sociologists Richard Arum and Josipa Roska. The first, “Academically Adrift,” suggested that collegiate students learned hardly anything in their four years; critical thinking and analysis suffered the brunt of this stagnation. The second study found that this lack of critical thinking was statistically significant when applied to the job market: students who learned more effectively showed more positive economic signals.

But if tests gauge what we learn, and it appears that we learn nothing at all, what are we left with?

These studies bring us back to an old debate: teaching fact versus teaching skills. Calvin does not seem to appreciate the facts. But what makes him such a unique character is his uncanny ability to think critically on worldly matters. He critiques post-modern art, espouses existential philosophy, examines the consumer culture — no wonder he’s a cynic that holds a remarkably low opinion of others and a superior opinion of himself. It’s hard to call the boy dumb, despite his inability to make four out of two and two. His intelligence is what seems to be lost in traditional testing.

Given that critical thinking is the most effective method of learning, we must learn how to test it properly. A large part of the process comes from experience, interaction and observation. It is active. Our tests should be just as active. Students should be tasked with asking their own questions, and using prior knowledge to attempt an answer. They could write a paper, give a presentation; many subjects will call for different modes of assessment. This form of testing is particularly useful in higher education, where students are closer to the frontiers of their field.

Ultimately, this form of testing would help students beyond the classroom — they would be able to approach ambiguity in the workspace with a greater set of tools. The downside is that it forsakes some ease of categorization. These assessments could fluctuate varying on the professor and different rubrics. But if the final outcome is sustainable knowledge, and a more economically sound workforce, this may not be so bad.

Unfortunately, we live in a multiple choice culture. And multiple choice by itself is a form of expediency and efficiency. In my psychology class last year, I sat in a lecture with 500 other kids. We were never assigned an essay. To give even one essay would mean hours of grading for teaching assistants. It would be impractical. But at what point does practicality become a hindrance to learning? At 500 kids, it seems. I barely remember a thing. At the time, I earned a “B,” and like Calvin, I felt like I played the system. But now, I feel like the system played me.

Education will always be a two-way deal. You need to be open, willing and motivated to learn. But that means your mentors and teachers must meet you with proper guidance and forms of assessment. I put a lot of effort into psychology, but I don’t think I could earn a “B” today. Sure, some things will always be lost, but I honestly feel like I would earn a “D” or an “F.” That’s too low.

Testing is a stressful process any way you go about it. Tests are what affect report cards and transcripts more than anything else. As our society becomes more competitive, the test will need to reflect what students have learned. Students and educators have a dual responsibility to ensure that tests properly assess critical thinking, and that there is a fair way to rank students according to this metric.

To test ELI FLESCH on his knowledge, you can reach him at ekflesch@ucdavis.edu or tweet him @eliflesch.

Music criticism ruined music for me.

When I was younger I sought the best music out there. Google led me to Pitchfork.com, which offered its bright, shiny opinions. I trusted them. As uncomfortable as Animal Collective’s obnoxious yelps and screams made me, Pitchfork told me that this was the best new thing to happen to music at the time. My opinion assimilated to theirs.

I listened to pop through their cynical headphones. “Fireflies” by Owl City? Psh, that’s a cliched, emasculated moan of a Postal Service rip-off (I was in sixth grade). I looked back at my old playlists. KT Tunstall? Norah Jones? No, not anymore. I was a new kind of music consumer — a smart one, getting the most value for my allowance dollar — and my impressionable brain would only seek out the best.

However, I soon found out that music criticism’s criteria of best and worst are subjective. One of the most unbearably written and produced records I’ve ever heard, How to Dress Well’s Love Remains, proudly holds an 8.7 on Pitchfork. The review addresses everything I hate about the record — its unintelligible lyrics, soulless warbling falsetto, drenching-wet reverb, lazy melodies — as something to appreciate as different and original. I realized that something was up; there was absolutely no merit to How To Dress Well’s music. For someone else, it was a beautiful, ethereal listening experience.

By the time I was in high school, I consumed music like a competitive eater, taking pride in the sheer amount of music that I bought. But I owned jewel case upon digipak upon slipcase of CDs half-listened to — artists’ work treated with the utmost disrespect of mere cursory attention. My heart broke when I picked up Cat Power’s Jukebox and could only name a single song from it. I was purchasing Pitchfork’s and Spin’s and Metacritic’s recommendations at a too-fast rate. I subscribed to their opinions so fanatically that I had none of my own.

What a burden to maintain my musical identity. I absolutely had to stay above the mainstream… oh God.

I was one of those people. A snob-in-denial corrupted by the devil’s Pitchfork.

Last summer, a much hyped band, FKA twigs, dropped their critically acclaimed debut LP1 to laudatory adjectives like “irresistable” (from The Independent), “euphoric” (Consequence of Sound) and “singular” (Resident Advisor). The album sorely disappointed me. And that was OK. People having their own opinions is a beautiful thing, but no one has the right to brainwash another’s mind. From then on, I strove to master my own opinion.

Now that I’m older and capable of attempting to master my own brain autonomy, I see music criticism as utterly useless. Criticism is the evaluation of the merits of an artistic work. It’s an ever-expanding universe based on human opinion, a troubling concept in itself.

Unlike literary criticism, where a plot hole or out-of-nowhere twist is undeniably poor storytelling, a musical non-sequitur is often billed as “brilliant” or “experimental” (e.g. every Deerhoof album ever). Unlike video game criticism, where glitches are always unwelcome, glitchy and buggy music is “the future” (Aphex Twin, anyone?). Unlike film criticism, where cliches of the past rarely rear their obsolete heads outside of campy homage, many serious artists thrive on the days of yore (Foxygen’s ’60s, Daft Punk’s ’70s, Haim’s ’80s, Jessie Ware’s ’90s).

Quantifying a musician’s art with an arbitrary number rating or letter grade belittles the soul put into it. Even rating-less high accolades are harmful because that pressures the artist into that genre, rendering any aesthetic change dangerous, career-threatening territory (like if John Green exclusively wrote tween cancer dramas). Bad reviews are caution tape, warning many potential listeners to stay away; one man’s trash becomes everyone’s trash if that man is a music critic.

I won’t flog anyone for following a music journal. They might be the best way to discover music outside of the front page of iTunes. Acknowledge, but do not slavishly follow critics. They hold an unwarranted stake in the industry; they are theives whose only asset is their sense of taste. Your sense of taste is just as valid, just as meaningful and just as correct.

Your opinion gets a 10.0 from STEVEN ILAGAN. Share it with him at smilagan@ucdavis.edu!

Pick up any fashion magazine, and you’re bound to be presented with page upon page of perfect-looking humans flaunting the latest trends. In many advertisements, you may find yourself faced with a very particular type of image (i.e. white, thin, young and beautiful), and the clothing that’s being advertised seems to be only secondary to the narrow sets of beauty standards that are promoted. While it’s easy to skim past these images without giving them a second thought, it’s important to be aware and critical of the images that we’re exposed to day after day. Whether we’re skimming through a magazine, watching television or simply driving past a bus stop, beauty myths become normalized every time we are exposed to them.

Advertisements perpetuating an ideal type of beauty have been around for decades. These images, which are virtually everywhere, are bound to have some effect on our psyches, whether we’re conscious of it or not. In fact, studies have shown that advertisements, which are quick and to the point, have more of a subconscious effect on people than anything else. It’s crucial then to take into consideration just how much the effects of these images impact our understanding of what it means to be beautiful.

Jean Kilbourne says it best in her series of documentaries, Killing Us Softly, as she claims that, “ads sell more than products … They sell concepts of normalcy … They tell us who we are and who we should want to be.” Pair this with her idea that “[if there’s only one way to be beautiful on offer], it can hardly be considered a choice to choose it,” and it’s clear where the body image issues that girls and women face are coming from.

Take, for example, Viti Levu, an island in Fiji where the rise of eating disorders and body dysmorphia were eerily proportionate to the introduction of television. Eating disorders and body image issues were virtually unheard of on the island before television became popular, but after a few years, the percentage of such issues increased phenomenally. According to the Klarman Eating Disorders Center at Harvard Medical School, the percentage of girls on the island who resorted to vomiting to control their weight rose from 3 percent to 15 percent, and girls who watched television frequently were 50 percent more likely to describe themselves as “too fat” than those who watched less television.

It’s not just women who face unrealistic standards of beauty. Men are posed with their own set of standards when it comes to their appearance: They must be shaped a certain way, have the right amount of body hair and be able to live up to the lifestyle that images of men are promoting.

Erving Goffman, a Canadian sociologist who studied how commercial advertisements shape our perceptions of femininity and masculinity, concluded that in many advertisements, women were portrayed as subordinate to men, “relating to them not as equals, but as children to parents.” Although his studies were mainly conducted in the ’80s, his findings are still incredibly relevant today. Women are still often pictured as aloof, in childish positions, self-touching and looking vulnerable or playful. Men, on the other hand, are often portrayed as alert and upright, with much more control over their bodies than their female counterparts.

Studies like these make it clear that there is more than meets the eye in what images in fashion ads perpetuate. With these standards of beauty comes inherent standards of being. Girls must be fragile, delicate, sensitive, coy and infantile, while boys must be strong, assertive, brave and insensitive. This could be why issues of domestic and sexual abuse are so prevalent, or why stereotypes of masculinity and femininity are still largely dominant in the ways we perceive men and women.

It’s easy to flip through a fashion magazine without taking into consideration what we’re actually looking at. While high-fashion and glamor are appealing at first glance, gender stereotypes and notions of unrealistic beauty are often lurking beneath the surface. These notions are harmful in many ways, one of which is the normalization of subordinate women and aggressive men. Being critical of images that perpetuate these sorts of narratives is the first step in changing the ways we approach sexism and other gender-related issues. So next time you find yourself face-to-face with a fashion ad, try looking a little closer and you might find that what’s being sold to you goes far beyond fashion.

To reach CHELSEA SPILLER, email them at ctspiller@ucdavis.edu.